With Colorado’s roller-coaster January weather so far, it is hard to depend on clear night skies. However, over the middle two weeks of the month, a recently discovered comet will be making its appearance in the southern skies.

Comet 2014 Q2 Lovejoy was discovered in August by amateur Australian astronomer Terry Lovejoy. The comet will reach its closet approach to the sun on Jan. 30. But it is closest to Earth starting the second week of January. It has been climbing each night, headed into the constellation Taurus and headed to the right side of Orion.

At its brightest (on Jan. 7), the comet will be about as bright as the faintest star in the Little Dipper. The brightness will be about the same for the next two weeks, so hopefully one of those nights will be clear!

The comet may be visible to the naked eye if you are in a dark enough area (although it would not be much more than a fuzzy star). But with binoculars, you might see a little bit of a tail and a green head. The green can be spectacular with the right telescope and camera.

The green color comes from the way the sun’s ultraviolet light interacts with diatomic carbon molecules in the comet.

This is the fifth comet discovered by Lovejoy. Both 2013 R1 Lovejoy and 2011 W3 Lovejoy put on good shows but, alas, only in the Southern Hemisphere. His latest discovery is not as bright, but can be seen by those of us in the Northern Hemisphere.

One way to see the comet for sure is by going online to the Virtual Telescope Project on Jan. 11. (There was also a showing on Jan. 6 but I missed it!)

According to NASA’s eclipse page, the eclipse will begin at about 3:18 p.m. on Oct. 23, reach its maximum about 4:36 p.m., and be over by 5:42 p.m. In this area, the moon will cover about 45 percent of the sun’s disc.

NASA predicts that this partial eclipse will be especially cool further east. In the eastern U.S., the eclipse will happen right at sunset, so the eclipse itself will sink colorfully behind the horizon.

Regis University’s department of physics and astronomy will have telescopes rigged with special filters to see the eclipse, solar flares, sunspots, and more. You can find them on the quad on their Lowell campus, 3333 Regis Blvd.

Meanwhile, the Denver Astronomical Society will be on hand for the eclipse at DU’s historic Chamberlin Observatory. DAS members will have solar scopes set up on the park lawn next to the observatory building.

A “blood moon” rises over Lakewood seen around 2 a.m., Tuesday, April 15, 2014. In a total lunar eclipse, the full moon turns a coppery red as it passes into Earth’s shadow. (RJ Sangosti, The Denver Post)

Now, here comes the second blood moon and Colorado is in a prime viewing position. According to NASA, the full eclipse will start at 4:25 a.m. MDT Wednesday and last until 5:24 a.m. (The partial eclipse begins at 3:18 a.m. and the peak is about 4:55 a.m.)

As we discussed in April, blood moons get their name from the fact they can appear red or reddish orange. That is because sunlight is refracted by the Earth’s atmosphere as our planet’s shadow covers the moon.

This is the second in the four eclipses that make a lunar tetrad. A tetrad is when there are four successive total lunar eclipses with no partial lunar eclipses in between — each of them separated by six full moons. (Eclipses 3 and 4 are coming on April 8, 2015 and Sept. 28, 2015.)

Tetrads are rare and common at the same time. This century, there will be several of them. But recently, up until the late 19th century, more than 300 years passed without a single tetrad. It is all up to the way the timing of the orbits involved fit together.

One thing that IS rare about the current tetrad is that all four eclipses will be visible in at least part of the United States. Also, the weather was clear in Denver for the last one and the forecast (at least as of now) is pretty clear for the next one.

This full moon is called the “Hunter’s Moon,” by the way. The “Harvest Moon” is the full moon closest to the autumnal equinox, and the “Hunter’s Moon” is the one following it.

A Perseid meteor streaks across the sky during the Perseid meteor shower on Aug. 11, 2009 in Vinton, Calif. (Kevin Clifford, AP)

With more “fireball” meteors on average than any other meteor shower, Perseid — the so-called “fireball champion” of meteor showers — is set to peak during the predawn hours on Wednesday.

NASA says this year’s Perseid meteor shower should peak early Wednesday around 3 a.m. with a projected 30 to 40 meteors per hour. Viewers should be able to spot meteors as soon as darkness falls, but activity will increase as dawn approaches and the constellation Perseus rises higher in the sky.

Under perfect conditions, Perseid can peak with as many as 100 meteors per hour. But tonight viewers will have to contend with the waning effects of Sunday’s full moon, which will reduce counts. Still, experts say the fireball meteors — very bright meteors that can be as bright as Jupiter or Venus — should outshine the now past-its-prime supermoon.

One day before the “supermoon,” a commercial airliner crosses the waxing gibbous moon on its final approach to Los Angeles Airport as viewed from Whittier, Calif., on July 11, 2014. (The Associated Press)

Now, it was acknowledged that the second supermoon — which is almost here — was likely to be the best, because it will be at its fullest at almost the same time it is closest to the Earth, making it the teeniest bit “bigger.”

The other two “come very close …. and unofficially have been granted the supermoon title,” the Post says with only a hint of condescension, later referring to the “not-so-supermoon.”

NASA — which has a vested interest in people looking at the starry skies — has been more in the three supermoon camp, although they admit this upcoming one is the best.

As measured from the centers of the Earth and moon, the August full moon will be 221,675 miles away. They won’t be that close again until September 2015. According to the U.S. Naval Observatory, the moon will be 12% bigger and 30% brighter than a run-of-the-mill full moon. (But the Naval Observatory overall is a party pooper when it comes to supermoons, saying “for the most part it is a “non-event” that is almost purely hype.”)

So there.

But, hey, if the weather is clear and especially when the moon is low in the sky, it will still be something to see on Sunday night. Plus, this is the Sturgeon Moon, which has to be worth a few bonus points.

The moon will be fullest at 12:09 p.m. Denver time (yes, right after noon) but no one seems to think that will mean the show will be that much lessened after sunset.

Two days after this supermoon, the Perseid meteor shower arrives. One of the draw backs of our supermoon is that even waning, it will be bright enough to obscure many of the 50-75 meteors that usually fall each hour. So Supermoon II vs. Perseid won’t be a fair fight.

As the moon rises behind them, fans watch a game between the between the Detroit Tigers and Kansas City Royals at Kauffman Stadium on July 11, 2014 at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City, Missouri. (Photo by Ed Zurga/Getty Images)

Call it a “supermoon summer.”

For the first of three times this summer, the full moon on Saturday is a so-called “supermoon.” Technically, the moon was at its fullest — or super-est — early morning Saturday before dawn, but look again to the east around 8:30 p.m. Saturday when, according the the Farmer’s Almanac, the supermoon will rise above the horizon.

Known scientifically as a “perigee moon,” a supermoon occurs when the moon passes Earth on the “perigee” side of its oval orbit around Earth — some 31,000 miles closer than usual. Two more supermoons will light up the night skies on Aug. 10 and Sept. 9.

NASA recommends paying extra attention to the supermoon on Aug. 10, as it could have some extra-super potential. On that day, the moon will become full during the same hour that it is closest to Earth. That supermoon will happen just after midnight.

But NASA says it’s actually super hard to tell the difference between a regular full moon and a supermoon. Though the moon is technically closer, the illusion of a supermoon comes when the moon is near the horizon when trees, buildings and other objects can make the moon look unnaturally large.

Conditions are shaping up to be less than optimal for those hoping to look to the cosmos tonight.

The weather disturbance bringing thunderstorms and rain across the Front Range this afternoon is expected to push out overnight, though it looks unlikely skies will clear in time for tonight’s meteor shower.

The best time to view the shower is said to be from midnight tonight through early Saturday morning (look to the northern sky to the right of the big dipper). But the National Weather Service is predicting 70 percent cloud cover over Denver at 11 p.m., thinning out to 58 percent by 3 a.m. Saturday. Overnight temperatures should hover in the mid-50s.

The mouthful will make its first appearance the night of May 23 and the morning of May 24. Peak activity is expected to be between midnight and 2 a.m. MDT.

What do these giraffes have to do with the Camelopardalids? A lot. Keep reading… (AP Photo, Stephanie Pilick)

All meteor showers are made up from bits of debris from comets and become visible as the Earth passes through the debris field. This time the field is made up of debris from Comet 209P/LINEAR. That minor comet, which orbits the sun every five years, was not discovered until 2004.

Some astronomers predict that all of the debris this comet has ejected between 1803 and 1924 could be in Earth’s path. That has experts predicting anywhere from less than 100 meteors an hour to an amazing 1,000 meteors an hour — more of a storm than a shower.

Total honesty here: The predictions of “1,000” were mostly made in 2012 or so. As the event has neared, most predictions have been scaled back to 200. Still, the experts admit that no one is sure of the numbers because we have never had a Camelopardalid shower before.

The shower will radiate from the constellation Camelopardalis, which is pretty much straight north: It circles Polaris and is near the two Dippers. Although the path of greatest visibility is farther to the east, Colorado should still get a show, weather permitting.

As an extra bonus, there isn’t much of a moon and what crescent there is doesn’t even rise until nearly 4 a.m.

Since you are wondering, “camelopardalis” comes from the Latin for “camel with markings like a leopard” — that is to say “a giraffe.”

(Romans didn’t see too many giraffes, although some did die in the arenas along with other exotic animals.)

The moon looks red during an eclipse, as shown in this photo taken during the total lunar eclipse Dec. 21, 2010. (photo by Robert Grover)

If you are willing to stay up very late on Monday, April 14 (or get up really early on Tuesday, April 15) you can check out a lunar eclipse. Astronomers say this eclipse will begin just before midnight Denver time, and totality will last from 1:07 to 2:25 a.m.

Lunar eclipses have two big advantages over solar eclipses: 1) You can look right at them and 2) they can be seen from wherever you can see the moon rather than only being visible in a narrow track.

This eclipse is the first of several expected in the next two years. That’s because it marks the start of a lunar tetrad. A tetrad is when there are four successive total lunar eclipses — with no partial lunar eclipses in between — each of which is separated from the other by six full moons. So look for lunar eclipses on Oct. 8 this year; April 8, 2015 and Sept. 28, 2015.

A lunar eclipse happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up and the Earth’s shadow falls on the moon. As the Earth’s dark shadow begins to cover the moon, the moon will look red or reddish-brown. That’s why an eclipse is sometimes called a “blood moon.” (It looks red because of refraction of sunlight by the the Earth’s atmosphere.)

The idea of eclipses — and blood moons — can get some people excited. The eclipses in this particular tetrad coincide with the full moon marking Passover (April 15, 2014 and April 4, 2015) and Sukkot (Oct. 8, 2014 and Sept. 28, 2015).

A book published last year, “Four Blood Moons: Something is about to change,” by John Hagee argues that the tetrad is a sign of the end times as predicted in Joel 2:31. Other doomsayers point to the blood-red moon of Revelation 6:12, with the fact that the Earth and Mars were aligned last week as an added bonus.

However, it is worth noting that there will be eight tetrads this century. And that Passover is always marked by a full moon because it is based on a lunar calendar.

I will admit that we can go for 300 years at a time with no tetrads, though.

Nicknamed the “Hand of God,” this object called a pulsar wind nebula is seen in a high-energy X-ray image. (NASA)

The “Hand of God” nebula is nothing new.

In the short-term, it has been around since NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory released photos of a pulsar wind nubula known as PSR B1509-58 (B1509 for short) in April 2009. In the longer term, even though scientists say it is a “young” nebula, it is 17,000 light years away.

A pulsar is the corpse of a star that died in a supernova explosion. The pulsar spins around at seven times per second, firing a particle wind into the material ejected in that explosion. These particles interact with magnetic fields around the material, causing it to glow with X-rays. (The pulsar itself can’t be seen.)

In the 2009 photos, the nubula cloud looked like an open hand. But NASA notes:

“The hand actually shrinks in the NuSTAR image, looking more like a fist, as indicated by the blue color. The northern region, where the fingers are located, shrinks more than the southern part, where a jet lies, implying the two areas are physically different.”

NASA said the red cloud at the end of the finger region is a different structure, called RCW 89. The agency says astronomers think the pulsar’s wind is “heating the cloud, causing it to glow with lower-energy X-ray light.”

The big question that scientists are still working on whether the whole structure is actually shaped like a hand or whether it’s an optical illusion.

Forecast Colorado is your place for the latest breaking weather news for Denver and Colorado, featuring the latest forecasts, road conditions and closures — with an occasional detour into meterological science, trivia and oddities.